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2017 Toulon Open
The 2017 Toulon Open took place October 27-29, 2017 in Toulon, France, as part of the Palais des Jeux et du Jouet (Toy & Games Festival). 58 official games were played by 113 players from Friday to Sunday. Romain Fauroux was the 2017 champion. On Days 1 and 2 (October 27th and 28th), players competed in 1-hour, 4-player games to earn points. A total of 113 unique players competed in games over those first two days. You could compete in as many consecutive games as you could during the time that the doors were open each day (10AM-7PM). Your cumulative point total across all the games you played on Friday and Saturday were then tallied. The 32 players with the highest points were then invited to play in a 1-hour quarter-final on Day 3 (Sunday, October 29th). The top 2 players at each of the 8 tables then advanced to a 1-hour semi-final round. The winner of each semi-final round then competed in the final match for the title. For the preliminary rounds, they used the point structure that has been used at the 2009 and 2015 World Championship. All games were also played with the Speed Die. For the quarter-final round and semi-final, they used "Grand Slam Tennis" style seeding. Quarterfinals Seating Semi-finals Seating Here is a recap of the tournament from judge Philippe Pinoli: 113 players took their chances, some often playing in seven games, others less, sometimes only one game, but sometimes it was enough to qualify. With this year's 113 players and 45 games, the qualification cut was at 19 points. Thus a victory with all 4 players left in the game, earning you 19 points, was enough to guarantee you would advance. Among the 32 quarter-finalists: *Three out of the three referees, allowed to participate, including Romain Fauroux, my best friend and 2017 french semi-finalist; David Couzot, and myself. *Other players who had competed at the 2017 France Championship: Aymane Boughalem, Yanis Athamnia, Nohman Mouala, Alexis Wattignies, Anne-Claire Pichard, Ionis Sigalas As ranking from the preliminary games would have a huge effect on your table seeding in the playoffs, the battle was fierce until Saturday’s last minutes of play, either to reach the 32nd slot or to avoid the best players as long as possible. The final ranking of the preliminary games was announced Saturday night at 9:30PM, and I texted the 32 lucky ones to let them know that they were qualified for the quarterfinals and had already won a Monopoly game as a prize. In case of players not being able to return for the final day of competition,other players were invited to join us on the tournament site in case of a forfeit. Almost all of the known favorite players qualified with a decent slot. I managed to get the 4th seed. 'Quarterfinals ' On Table 1, Top seed Aymen advanced with young Luc Arnal, a lucky loser who had been an alternate. Table 2 had 2nd Place Yanis advance with Samuel Donzé. Table 3 advanced David Couzot and Guillaume. Table 4 advanced yours truly and Johan. I got the purple set through a deal with Ottmane, who got the dark blue in exchange. But Johan and his 4 railways managed to survive enough to join me in the semifinals. Upsets at table 5 as top seeds Sidney Benita (5th Place), who came from Paris and beat me twice on Friday and Anne-Claire Pichard (12th Place) are bankrupted by Pascal and Laure. Both top seeds survived on table 6, Eric Mathieu and Ludovic Chanut. Huge upsets at table 7, as 10 year old Camille and Frédéric Wieczanek get rid of their two better ranked opponents. Both of the top seeded players advance at table 8, Romain Fauroux (8th Place) and Nohman Mouala (9th Place). 'Semifinals ' Table 1 sees Ludovic Chanut best top seed Aymen. Nohman’s Yellow houses tops Yanis momopoly-less 4 Railroads, Laure’s favorite trick of dark blues and Camille’s purple houses…she falls under the attendance applause. There was an epic battle on table 3 as Romain Fauroux (8th Place) survives a crazy start by David Couzot. On table 4, I start 4th but my second dice roll brings me from Reading Railroad to the Community Chest and the card takes me to…. Reading Railroad. My 1st turn is quickly finished and I’ll be first to play the speed dice…Unfortunately, no Mister Monopoly nor doubles for long turns and my opponents also finished their 1st turn with numerous doubles. Worse, Eric got a natural Light Blue monopoly and immediately built 3 hotels. Even worse, Franck sold him Baltic to form a second monopoly and a 4th and 5th hotel! I managed to arrange a three player deal and got 3 Railroads, and 1 house on each purple…but too little, too late. 'Final Match ' The final gathered Eric Mathieu (6th Place), Romain Fauroux (8th Place), Nohman Mouala (9th Place), Ludovic Chanut (11th Place in the Prelims), and Philippe Pinoli as banker. It was a very short and no suspense final as Romain gathered a dozen of properties with doubles and Mr. Monopolies. When he mortgaged everything to form the dark blue set and build his first 2 houses…it was almost over. He refused Nohman's $500 offer for the last red and, as Eric and Ludovic couldn’t settle for an unbalanced deal between oranges and greens, Romain chose his last opponent offering Eric the purple set against a green and a orange. Eric builds to 3 houses, and Romain goes to jail. Nohman survives Romain’s brown hotels but dies on Park Place. As Eric and Ludovic now were fighting for 2nd place, Ludovic escapes from jail and dies on Park Place hotel. On the next die roll, Eric died on the same properties and, in 32 minutes, Romain won it all! Category:France Category:2017